I'm in the market to buy either a motorcycle or scooter. Currently, our SMB is my every day driver. However, our office is moving downtown in a couple months which would allow me to ride a motorcycle/scooter to work (all surface streets). Besides, parking the SMB downtown would be next to impossible.
I've owned a street bike in the past. However, I figured since I'm buying something, it would be fun & convenient to also bring it on the SMB when traveling. I will get a rear hitch mount for this. I want to get a smaller bike/scooter (250cc or less). Also, I doubt I will ever be into the major trail riding or the desert scene, but it will need to be able to handle at least the same roads the SMB travels down. Finally, it needs to be capable of handling two smaller riders (wife & I).
The scooter I've been looking at is the
Yamaha Zuma 125 The only reasons I'm consider a scooter is for the storage and the possibility of my wife riding it. However, I’m guessing there are plenty of aftermarket storage options for a motorcycle. Who knows, this may also be the perfect one for me as well. My biggest concern is that loading it onto a hitch mount on the SMB could be problematic due to the wider profile of a scooter.
As far as motorcycles go, I've been researching various small dual sports including the following:
I picked these three due to their lower weights. I'm guessing that 90% of the use will be on road. I'm hopefully going to do some test drives in the next couple of weeks. I'd love to buy used if the right one is available.
Any advice/comments would be greatly appreciated. Thanks as always.
-Geoff